Today I'd like to encourage you to check out some true undergound freak-squad music. Mutwawa, from Richmond, VA.
This 2-man unit combines mutated African rhythms and sounds, perhaps akin to the vibe of Konono No 1, with the gritty, experimental synth-stomp of Forcefield. Both members have long and impressive resumes: Jason Hodges is credited with samples and has played in the power-violence bass-n-drums band Suppression, freakout post-punk band The Amoeba Men, Bermuda Triangles... the list goes on. All of them highly recommended. Gary Stevens is credited with effects, and he is also the founding member of noise band Head Molt and for several years ran the infamous DIY house/venue The Rat-Ward. Again, I could go on...
Mutwawa - Live at Strange Matter - March 8, 2011 - Richmond, Virginia
from Silver Persinger on Vimeo.
Embedded below is their first album "Necro Zulu" which can also be dowloaded. I have to point out that I love how this album is composed of songs. Mutwawa can do the noise band M.O. of cranking out one solid 15-minute set too, which works live (just check out how well they work that format in the video above), but I do appreciate the extra bit of self-editing that goes into boiling your material down to a batch of 2-3 minute highlights. It also makes an album that much more repeat-listenable for me, and this is a good one. Play this on something with some good bass.
http://freemusicarchive.org/music/MUTWAWA/Necro_Zulu
CNP Records blog, Jason's record label
Rat-Ward blog, for all of Gary's projects
Thanks to Silver Persinger for documenting so many live shows in Richmond. The Vimeo account is worth further inspection. http://vimeo.com/freesilver2
Posted by: tommy | May 10, 2011 at 03:27 PM
call me a dork...but i want a high resolution wav file of this here.
Posted by: afterbirther | May 10, 2011 at 04:43 PM
This is brilliant. I stated the morning with Mutwawa, not the easiest wake up music, but it was alerting nevertheless.
thanks for posting !
Posted by: Yair Yona | May 11, 2011 at 04:11 AM